


I've Got You

by NervousAsexual



Series: Whumptober 2020 [22]
Category: Fallout 4
Genre: Crying, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Family Feels, Found Family, Hurt/Comfort, Nick is a good dad, Piper is a good sister, Poisoning, Pre-Canon, Sort Of, Underage Drinking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-22
Updated: 2020-10-22
Packaged: 2021-03-08 20:14:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,729
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27152302
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NervousAsexual/pseuds/NervousAsexual
Summary: Piper and Nat Wright are the last people Nick expected to find on his doorstep in the middle of the night.
Relationships: Nat Wright & Piper Wright, Nick Valentine & Piper Wright
Series: Whumptober 2020 [22]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1960987
Comments: 1
Kudos: 18
Collections: Whumptober 2020





	I've Got You

**Author's Note:**

> Whumptober prompt #22--poisoned/drugged

Clients rarely showed up after dark--not that he blamed them. If he were human he'd probably hesitate before venturing down a dark alley lit only by a single pink neon sign, too. But every once in a while somebody came, and so Nick kept an ear out while he went over old case files. That was how he happened to hear the knock at the office door at two in the morning over the sound of the deluge outside.

He checked his sidearm before he unlocked the door. DC security was great if you were a human, but he was still a little leery of strangers.

The teenager he found there, drenched to the bone, grinning drunkenly, carrying a sleepy-looking toddler on her hip, was not a stranger.

"It's you!" Piper said, a little too loudly. "Nicky V! Just the person I was looking for!"

"Get in here before you both catch your death." He stepped aside to let her wobble in and locked the door again behind them. Even with his unreliable sense of smell she reeked of moonshine.

"I'm fine." Piper bumped into the armchair he kept for clients and practically fell into it. She looked tiny, dwarfed by the tall, corn-yellow chair. "Doing better than before even."

"Uh-huh." He looked around for a blanket, a towel, something, and found nothing. He grabbed his coat off the stand and handed it to her. "Wrap up the kid before _she_ catches her death."

The kid stared at him, brow wrinkled, mouth turned down in a frown, like she was eighty instead of four.

"Be cool, Nat," Piper warned her, taking off the kid's wet clothes as if it were second nature. She wrapped the kid up in the coat and pointed her at Nick. "You remember Mr. Valentine, right?"

Nat continued to stare doubtfully.

"Well, even if you don't, he's one of the good guys."

Something almost human tugged in his chest at that. He shook his head. _Valentine, you and your damn soft touch..._

"Right, Nick?"

He glanced back. It was hard to see her eyes under the soaked mass of her hair and hat. "Sure, kid. There's a bed back there. You both look like you could use it."

"How about it, Nat?" Piper turned the kid back to look at her. "Ready to get back to bed?"

Nat stared at her for a moment, then looked back at Nick.

"She stinks," she said.

"Nat!" Piper's face, already pink from rain or booze or both, flushed scarlet.

"I have to give her that one," Nick told her. When he came closer Nat held her arms up toward him and he hefted her up onto his hip.

"Yeah, well... so what." Piper didn't move as they rounded the corner to the bedroom. "You stink too. You stink and I stink. This whole rotten city stinks."

Trying not to think too hard about the stains on the bare mattress, he tried to put Nat down on his bed but she clung to him like a burr. "I got a change of clothes in one of those boxes behind my desk. Why don't you get yourself into some dry clothes and I'll take care of Nat." He looked back to Nat. "Are you going to sleep in the bed or what?"

"No." Nat wrapped her arms and legs around him and hung on. His chest hurt again. He'd never given much thought to whether or not he'd like having kids around. Figured with his anatomy it hardly mattered. And now he knew for sure--he was a massive sucker. If any kid called him dad he'd be wrapped around their finger.

"You gotta fall asleep sometime," he told her. "I got all night."

"No!" She buried her face into his shoulder.

"Nat, quit clinging." Piper came around to join them. She looked totally lost in his clothes. "Mr. Valentine's got stuff to do."

"She's fine. Don't worry about it." He nodded down to the bed. "Now how about you get some sleep, and tomorrow morning you can tell me all about how you ended up on my doorstep in the middle of the night."

Piper had been smiling, barely. Now any trace of it vanished from her face. "I don't think that's a good idea."

Her tone was so shut down it was obvious she didn't want to talk about it. "Suit yourself. Want some coffee?"

"No. I don't know." She sat down on the edge of the bed. "Maybe later."

"Well, just let me know." He took a seat beside her. She didn't move. "I hear congratulations are in order. _Publick Occurrences_ is all anyone can talk about."

Her shoulders hunched a bit. She pressed her legs together over her hands.

"I got a copy myself. It's great writing, Piper. You've got a real gift."

"Oh, god." She pulled her hands up to rub at her eyes. "Nicky, I screwed up. Big time."

Nick glanced down at Nat, but she appeared to have dozed off again. "Why don't you tell me what happened."

"I can't. I don't want to get you in trouble, too."

"I've been in trouble since the day the Institute tossed me out. You get used to it after a while." She made a sound somewhere between a laugh and a sob. "Tell me what's going on and we'll figure it out together."

She raised her head out of her hands enough to look at him with one eye. "Please don't be mad. I was at the Dugout."

"Aren't you..."

"Too young to be drinking. I know, I know, you always say that but I thought this time, just this once, just because the paper was turning out so well... Please don't be mad."

"I'm not mad, Piper. Thank you for telling me."

"That's not it, though. I was just going to have a beer to celebrate, and one of the Bunker Hill traders bought it for me. I wasn't paying enough attention, I didn't realize it wasn't Vadim at the bar, and... and the drink tasted weird."

If he'd had a heart it would have stopped beating.

"I started feeling all woozy. I don't know what he slipped me, but I knew I had to get it out. I didn't know what to do! I did the first thing I could think of that would make me throw up."

"You raided Vadim's still."

"I raided Vadim's still." She looked up at him. Her eyes were red with booze and tears and exhaustion. "One of the guards grabbed the bartender and took him to the pen, but I recognized him, Nick. He works for the caravan cartel. They sent him after me." She hiccuped. "I should've kept my stupid mouth closed. They didn't even know who I was before I started printing. I shoulda just let them do whatever it is they're doing and stayed out of it. But I didn't and now a bunch of people want me dead, and if they can't get to me I'm scared they'll go after Nat, and I don't know what to do."

For a moment he let her sob. What was he going to say that would take back what had happened? Nothing. There was nothing he could do to fix it, and to offer solutions or give her vague "it'll be okay" nonsense wouldn't help. He let her cry for a moment, and then he gently pulled a handkerchief from the coat wrapped around Nat. He offered it to her.

"Thanks." She took it and rubbed her face all over with it. She'd never used one before, he realized with the smallest touch of amusement. "What am I gonna do? If it was just me it'd be one thing but I gotta take care of Nat and I don't want her to get hurt..."

He knew the feeling--being ambivalent about your own safety but willing to die to keep somebody safe. Even now, two hundred years post-apocalypse, that wasn't something a teenager should have to feel. He awkwardly placed a hand on her shoulder, and, to his surprise, she moved closer, burying her face in his shoulder and crying and crying. He put an arm around her shoulders experimentally. She held onto him tight.

What was he supposed to do? Nobody had hugged him since... ever, actually. Who would want to hug something like him? But she was doing it, and he had no idea how to respond.

"I want you and Nat to stay with me for a while," he said at last. "In the morning we'll go back to your place, you can pack some things, and when things calm down and you're ready you can go back. For now I'd feel better if I knew you were somewhere safe."

"Really?" She raised her eyes to his.

"Yeah, really. It's not like I use this." He gestured vaguely at the bed. "I know you like your independence but I don't want to see anything happen to you."

"I-I don't have a lot of caps right now, everything's tied up in the printing press, but once we get everything running smooth..."

_Caps?_ he thought, briefly confused then suddenly appalled. "I don't want your caps, Piper. I'm not doing this for you because you're my client. I'm doing it for you because you're my friend."

She held onto him even tighter. "Friend?"

"Yeah. You know what those are, right? You're not such a big-shot journalist that you've forgotten about friends."

She cried a little and giggled a little. She was definitely still feeling the moonshine.

"I don't know what we're going to do, kid. But you're not in this alone." He didn't know what it was but something about that set her off and she cried and cried and cried. He had no idea what to do, so he just stayed there and rubbed her back and said, "Hey, hey, shh. You're okay. You're okay. I'm here. I've got you. You're okay."

She cried herself to sleep like that and he sat there the rest of the night with one Wright sister sleeping against each shoulder.

_Poor kids_ , he thought. All they had was each other.

Well, they had each other, and now he had them. And while he was still around, there wasn't a damn thing that was going to hurt them anymore.


End file.
